Meg Cabot - All American Girl

“It’s too bad,” he said. “I really thought you weren’t like any of the other girls I know.”

And with a polite goodnight—that’s it, just a ‘Goodnight’—he turned around and went back down to the car. He didn’t even look back. Not once.

Not that I could blame him, I guess. Despite Catherine’s assertion that boys ought to know girls our age are ‘playing the field’ (which sounds pretty funny coming from her, Miss-I-Just-Went-Out-With-A-Boy-For-The-First-Time-Ever-Tonight), I imagine it might kind of suck to find out the person who’d asked you out really liked someone else—would even rather have been out with that person, instead.

I don’t know. I guess I could see why David was kind of peeved with me.

But come on. I’d asked him to a party, not to marry me, or anything. It was just a party . What was the big deal?

And what was all that junk about being wrong about me being different from all the other girls he knew? How many other girls did he know who’d saved his dad’s life lately? Uh, not that many, I was willing to bet.

Still, the evening wasn’t a total washout. Some of my celebrity must have rubbed off on Catherine, because other people at the party finally started talking to her. She had stood there, beaming, Paul at her side, and had all of her popular-girl fantasies realized. Someone even invited her to another party, the following weekend.

“You know,” Catherine, the new It Girl of Adams Prep said, from the couch. “I really think Jack was jealous.”

I blinked up at the ceiling at this piece of information. “Really?”

“Oh, yes. I heard him tell Lucy that he thinks David is pompous and that you could do better.”

Pompous ? David was the least pompous person I had ever met. What was Jack talking about?

When I mentioned this out loud, though, all Catherine said was, “But, Sam, I thought that was what you wanted. To make Jack realize that you are a vital, attractive woman, desired by many.”

I admitted that this was true. At the same time, however, I didn’t like the idea of anybody—even my soulmate—calling David names. Because David was a very nice person.

Only I didn’t want to think about that. You know, about David being so nice, and me treating him the way I had. I mean, that kind of behaviour is all very well for readers of Cosmo , but I’m really more of an Art in America kind of girl.

Knowing that sleep was a long way off, but aware that Catherine, by the sound of her steady breathing, was no longer available, I got out my flashlight and opened the book the White House press secretary had given me, on the lives of the First Ladies.

Top ten Little Known Facts about Dolley Ptyne Todd Madison, Wife of the Fourth President of the United States of America:

10. She spelled her name Dolley, not Dolly.

9. Born in 1768, she was raised as a Quaker, eschewing colourful bonnets and clothes, as Quaker tradition dictated.

8. She was married once before to a Quaker lawyer who died in a yellow-fever epidemic.

7. After marrying James Madison in 1794, Dolley acted as “unofficial first lady” during the presidency of Thomas Jefferson, who was a widower.

6. It was apparently around this time that Dolley decided God didn’t care if she wore bright colours, because she is described as having worn a gold turban with an ostrich feather tucked into it at her husband’s inaugural ball.

5. The fact that Dolley abandoned her Quaker ways is further illustrated by the fact that during her husband’s presidency, she became the belle of Washington society. She was best known for her Wednesday evening receptions, where politicians, diplomats and the general public gathered. These gatherings helped to soothe some of the tensions between Federalists, who were like today’s Republicans, and Republicans, who were like today’s Democrats, in a time of intense party rivalries.

4. During the War of 1812, Dolley saved not only George Washington’s portrait, but she also saved tons of important government documents by pressing them against the sides of trunks. The day before the British attacked, she filled a wagon with silver and other valuables and sent them off to the Bank of Maryland for safekeeping, which just goes to show she was not only brave, but also proactive.

3. But the majority of US citizens in 1814, when this all happened, were not very appreciative of Dolley’s actions, since they all hated her husband for starting the war in the first place. In fact, as the White House was burning down, Dolley went to the neighbours and knocked on the door, looking for sanctuary, and they told her to get lost. She didn’t find a place to stay until she lied about who she was.

2. As if this was not enough, one of her sons turned out to be a profligate, which means loser, whose out-of-control spending nearly bankrupt the family.

And the number one little known fact about Dolley Madison:

1. She wasn’t really very attractive.

The next week was Thanksgiving. Susan Boone had class on Tuesday, but it was cancelled on Thursday, on account of the holiday.

I figured that when I saw David in the studio on Tuesday, I would say I was sorry for what had happened at Kris’s. I mean, even though Catherine insisted I hadn’t done anything wrong, and part of me felt like she was right, another part of me—a bigger part of me—disagreed. I figured at the very least I owed David an apology. I was going to ask him if he wanted to go bowling with me and Catherine and Paul the following Friday. I knew Lucy had a game that night, so there wouldn’t be a chance of us running into Jack. That way David would know I’d asked him out for him, and not to make Jack jealous.

I didn’t know why it was so important to me that David understood he was wrong . . . that I wasn’t like the other girls he knew, that I wasn’t trying to impress anyone, especially a guy. Especially my sister’s boyfriend. That I liked to wear black. That the daisies on my boots had been my idea.

I just really wanted to make everything between us OK again.

Except that David didn’t come to class on Tuesday.

David didn’t come to class, and it wasn’t like there was anybody there that I could ask why. You know, like if he was sick or not. I mean, Gertie and Lynn weren’t friends with David. I was. And I didn’t know why he wasn’t there. Was he sick? Had he left early for Camp David, where he and the rest of his family were going to spend Thanksgiving, according to the news and the folks in the press office? I didn’t know.

All I knew was, as I sat there drawing the gourds Susan Boone had arranged on the table in front of us, my daisy helmet on my head to guard against aerial crow assaults, I felt pretty stupid.

Stupid because of how disappointed I was that David hadn’t showed. Stupid because I actually thought it would be that simple—I’d just apologize and that would be the end of it.

But most of all, I felt stupid that I even cared. I mean, I didn’t even like David. Oh, sure, as a friend I liked him all right.

And yeah, there was that freaky frisson thing that happened every once in a while when I was around him.

But it wasn’t like just because of that, I was going to forget all about Jack. OK, yeah, he had acted like a jerk at Kris’s party. But that didn’t mean I’d fallen out of love with him, or anything. I mean, when you have loved someone as much and for as long as I have loved Jack, you totally see beyond jerky behaviour and that kind of thing. The way I felt about Jack was deeper than that. Just like, I knew, the way he felt about me was deeper than the way he felt about Lucy.